Another series in the books another series win, this time a thumping of the Braves. Next up on the docket are the Reds, a team that was seen as a potential dark horse candidate in the division. So far the Reds sit at 11-11 with a pythag record of 9-13. Before I dig into the normal series preview I’ll note one quick methodology change (for more about the methodology you can see this post. Sorry about not linking that in previous previews). From here on out I’ll be updating the projections on a semi regular basis (maybe not every series, but probably at least once a week or so). To do that I’m going to take the CHONE projection and weight it by (1*(2009 PA)+0.8*(2008 PA)+0.6*(2007 PA)+200)/( (1*(2009 PA)+0.8*(2008 PA)+0.6*(2007 PA)+200+(2010 PA)) and take the current stat (wOBA for hitters, xFIP (for now, maybe BB FIP in the future) for pitchers)) weighted by 2010 PA/that stuff I had in the denominator above. Adding those two terms together gives the new “true talent projection”. The only caveat is that I weight minor league PAs as 0.5*PA. Could I just use updated ZIPS? Yep but, for whatever reason I started with CHONE, and I enjoy doing things myself anyway.

On to the preview. First up is the Card’s lineup

Name

wOBA

DEF/150

RC/Game

1

Skip Schumaker

0.331

-5

0.574207

2

Ryan Ludwick

0.357

1

0.657092

3

Albert Pujols

0.432

5

0.932839

4

Matt Holliday

0.388

6.5

0.748355

5

Colby Rasmus

0.354

5.5

0.607518

6

Yadier Molina

0.328

8

0.499671

7

David Freese

0.342

0

0.534981

8

Brendan Ryan

0.304

7

0.396725

9

Pitcher

0.2

0

0.04831

Game Tot

0.186667

4.999699

And the Reds

Name

wOBA

DEF/150

RC/Game

1

Drew Stubbs

0.31571

8

0.506291

2

Orlando Cabrera

0.318197

-0.5

0.501983

3

Joey Votto

0.391938

2.5

0.771881

4

Brandon Phillips

0.33364

7.5

0.540472

5

Scott Rolen

0.345295

8

0.566604

6

Jay Bruce

0.376548

4.5

0.658623

7

Jonny Gomes

0.349563

-10

0.551189

8

Ramon Hernandez

0.325325

-0.5

0.461619

9

Pitcher

0.2

0

0.047638

Game Tot

0.13

4.6063

And the pitching staffs, starting with the Cards

Starter

Starter ERA

IP/GS

Bullpen ERA

Game 1

Brad Penny

4.09

6

3.7

Game 2

Kyle Lohse

4.25

5.33

3.7

Game 3

Chris Carpenter

3.12

7

3.7

And the Reds

Starter

Starter ERA

IP/GS

Bullpen ERA

Game 1

Johnny Cueto

4.56

5.66

3.86

Game 2

Homer Bailey

4.57

5.66

3.86

Game 3

Aaron Harang

4.29

6.33

3.86

Adding the pitching and the defense yields a runs allowed table of

Game 1

Game 2

Game 3

Reds

4.546863

4.550207

4.396201

Cards

4.114451

4.188855

3.34673

Just looking at the lineups and pitching staffs it appears that the Cards should have the edge in both scoring and run prevention. That plus home field advantage should make for a nice series for the Cards. What does the simulation have to say about how nice of a series?